Can't really put a finger on one particular thing that makes this one of the worst countries on the planet. Today kinda sealed the deal in our deep and utter hatred for this country. If we could move our flight up to now we would.
Hanoi reached deep into its pocket full of dog sh*t and hurled a gob so foul we almost caved and called our moms. But we're tough and can surely take a punch so we're driving on with italy only 6 day away!
The morning started out around 4 AM when the poltergeist who lives in our room started screaming. I clutched Carolyn for a bit before falling back asleep until she (the poltergeist) returned around 7:30 AM. She must be a bad poltergeist cause she's always crying ... probably getting her ghostly arse kicked for keeping the other poltergeists up. At this point we were too tired to care much so we rolled over and fell back asleep.
Fast forward a bit. We leave our room and go to the front desk to pay for our halong bay tour ($350 ... Cringe). We're already pretty annoyed with the price since we were quoted in USD $ but can only pay in Vietnamese dong. So the guy gives us some stoopid sob story about the boat company only wants USD $ and has to exchange from dong to USD, so therefore we get a crappy exchange rate. This translates to the tour costing us $358 instead of $350 because of the exchange rate. Anyway, the hotel guy is extremely accommodating and accepts our exchange rate. However as we try to pay him he realizes that one of the bills (500,000 dong - ~$25) has been taped up and repaired using a piece from a 10,000 dong bill. WTF!!!!!! They are silly strict about the quality of their bills here. Generally they won't accept a bill with any tears in it. Of course we got this bill from the ATM last night and don't look at the money. After some discussion he agrees to take it but I'm sure he's gonna loose some $ because of it.
We leave the hotel looking for food. We decide on street food and find a place with some other whitey's eating there. We sit down and order scrambled eggs and bread, a sprite and iced coffee with milk. My iced coffee comes with a glob of condensed milk at the bottom and won't mix. They didn't use fresh coffee, instead they poured old cold coffee into a cup with condensed milk. Strike 1. Then our food comes. It's 2 baguettes sliced down the middle oozing disgusting mayonnaise and filthy cucumbers. We look at each other, I vomit in mouth and then we ask the guy what he just gave us. He explains the bread has scrambled eggs and all the other nastiness inside the bread. We ask if he can atleast get rid of the mayo and maybe bring another plate. He takes the food away and comes back 3 minutes later with the exact same thing. Clearly there's a giant breakdown in communication so we cut our loses, pay our bill and leave.
Finally found a decent breakfast which ended up costing about $10 if you factor in our first breakfast. Walked to a cafe and hung out until the water puppet show started at 1530.
We bought 2nd class tickets to the show which were 60,000 each. This put us in the last row which didn't matter since the place is tiny. What did matter however was the size of the seats and the amount of room. If you are under 5'8" then you would have enjoyed a fabulous, comfortable show. Carolyn and I are not under 5'8" and consequently we had a miserably show. I moved to an aisle seat after a fewer minutes which helped me and gave the mrs more room. Besides that, the show was super cool. A band plays some music and sings while puppets come up out of the water and dance around (http://www.thanglongwaterpuppet.org/?/en/Home/). Super cool!
After the puppets we did some walking trying to find a supermarket to get some supplies. Never found one but we did find a minority people photography exhibit which my wonderful wife nicely narrated for me!!! We also found the US ambassadors house. More walking around followed by some much deserved ice cream. Ran into some people at the ice cream place with a guide who said you can't come to Hanoi without coming to that ice cream shop. We couldn't agree more! The place is called Kem Trang Tien (http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g293924-d2207854-Reviews-Kem_Trang_Tien-Hanoi.html).
Decided on a vegetarian restaurant for dinner and were not disappointed. It was in a creepy back alley with some old guy in his pajamas but the food was delish!
Grabbed some agua on the way home and perused the 1000's of shoe shops around.
We're heading to halong bay tomorrow AM at 8 and won't be back until the evening of the 22nd. Hope it's a great time.
Pics:
1) Carolyn with our delish vegetarian meal!
2) water puppet theater.
3) Carolyn at the water puppet theater.
4) us at the ambassadors house.
5) water puppet show.
6) best ice cream in Hanoi!
7) these minority people suck your brains out if you have a headache! According to my interpretation of course.
8) carolyn narrating the minority people's photos.
Mom would have answered :) 3>
ReplyDelete